The setlist of that show is absolutely a Beck’s fan dream, 25 songs covering his whole career, three new ones, ‘Sorry’ and ‘Heaven’s Ladder’ and ‘Don’t Act Like Your Heart Isn’t Hard’, a few medley, a few covers, and among them ‘She Thinks I Still Care’ from George Jones’ who died recently.
Of course, some avid fan did a recording of some of the new ones and you can watch ‘Sorry’ and ‘Heaven’s Ladder’ below, filmed by someone who must have been just below Beck’s nose. ‘Sorry’ is rather upbeat with a catchy chorus ‘Used to be happy/ Used to be laughing’ and a very-Beck bridge, but nothing really memorable lyrics-wise. You know, the Beck of surrealist lines like ‘In the time of chimpanzees I was a monkey/Butane in my veins so I’m out to cut the junkie’, ‘With the rerun shows and the cocaine nose job’ is long gone!
‘Heaven’s Ladder’ seems to be more complex, with original ascending chord progressions reaching difficult super-high notes as he did in some songs from ‘Sea Change’, the kind of song I would like to listen to with a full orchestration.
But if you live in London, you may know by now that Beck has announced a special ‘Song Reader’ night at Barbican on July 4th with a long list of guest musicians including Pulp frontman Jarvis Cocker, Franz Ferdinand, Charlotte Gainsbourg, Beth Orton, Joan Wasser aka Joan As Police Woman, Villagers frontman Conor J O’Brien, The Staves, Guillemots, Michael Kiwanuka, James Yorkston and The Pictish Trail and more. A must see if you are in London.
Here is the setlist for Beck’s performance in Santa Cruz
1. The Golden Age
2. Jack-ass
3. Modern Guilt
4. Everybody’s Gotta Learn Sometime (The Korgis cover)
5. Sorry
6. Heaven’s Ladder
7. Asshole
8. Nitemare Hippy Girl
9. Strange Apparition
10. Lost Cause
11. Don’t Let It Go
12. Unforgiven
13. She Thinks I Still Care (George Jones cover)
14. Sissyneck
15. MTV Makes Me Want To Smoke Crack / Free Fallin’ / Pay No Mind (medley)
16. Dead Melodies
17. Don’t Act Like Your Heart Isn’t Hard
18. Evil Things (!)
19. Morning
20. I Am The Cosmos (Chris Bell cover)
21. Sunday Sun
22. Girl
Encore
23. Debra / Bennie And The Jets
24. One Foot In The Grave
25. Where It’s At / Humpty Dance / One Foot In The Grave
For those interested, there is even a bootleg of the show posted here, Beck’s fans are so dedicated! And one last thing, the person who posted the setlist said Beck played a few songs he didn’t recognize, that may well be some new ones off his forthcoming acoustic album, an album that has been described as ‘a self-contained work, one that came in the form of a burst of inspiration following the completion of last year’s groundbreaking Song Reader sheet music album.’
But to know more about all this, catch Beck during his brief solo tour:
5/19 Santa Cruz, California | Rio Theatre
5/20 San Francisco, California | Davies Symphony Hall (Song Reader event)
7/02 Paris, France | Days Off Festival
7/27 Wantagh, New York | Americanarama Festival
7/28 Newport, Rhode Island | Newport Folk Festival
7/30 Portland, Maine | State Theatre
8/02 Boston, Massachusetts | Bank of America Pavilion
8/04 Brooklyn, New York | Prospect Park Bandshell